A/N: Sorry about the long delay; I've got real life and my other Alias story both vying for my attention.
Chapter 3: Choir Practice
"I can't believe that Laura Bristow could possibly be a spy, Arvin," Mark Dawson said.
"According to Valenko, she's a KGB plant. Her real name is Irina Derevko. He even gave us the name of the hotel where he met with her to get information," Sloane said.
Dawson shook his head. "God, Arvin, you've seen them together. Heck, you're friends with them. Do you really believe that woman is acting? She's obviously in love with him."
"It seems impossible to me, too, but Valenko was quite specific."
"All right. I suppose we'll have to at least look into it. Put her under surveillance and do a full background check. And get as much information about this hotel where they supposedly meet as possible. If Laura Bristow should happen to have a meeting with her KGB handler, as ridiculous as that sounds, I want to be able to record it."
Arvin nodded and left to set everything up. Dawson sat down and opened the interrogation folder. How could it be possible? Every man in the office who had ever seen Jack and Laura together was jealous; the two of them were so obviously, deeply in love. He shook his head. Valenko had been lying, he was sure of it. He would watch Laura Bristow for a while, perhaps a month; nothing would happen, and she would be cleared. He was absolutely positive of that.
***
On a chilly Thursday night, two CIA agents sat smoking in a surveillance van across the street from a church. They were both thoroughly bored; they'd had the 4 p.m. to midnight shift trailing Laura Bristow for seven of the last eight days. "This is ridiculous," one of the men said. "She's clean."
"She's in the godd*** church choir, for crying out loud," the other man said. They lapsed back into silence as they listened to the music drifting from the church.
Inside the church, Irina's mind was not fully on the music she was singing. She had a new handler, and she was meeting him tonight. She only knew that it was a different person by the handwriting on the note. She was also being tailed, and had been for the past week. She didn't know whether it was KGB, who had done spot surveillance on her for the past ten years, or the CIA. The last week had been nerve-wracking. She had found herself thinking yesterday that she wished it were all over; she was so tired of the lies, of loving her husband and daughter while knowing that they would one day hate her. She had reminded herself that going back to Russia would only make things worse; first there would be months of debriefing, and then, given her success on this mission, she would likely be sent out on another "swallow" mission.
"Good work tonight, everyone," the choir director said, startling her out of her thoughts. "I'll see you all on Sunday."
"Is everything all right, Laura?" asked Emily Sloane, a fellow choir member, as they put their music away.
"Yes, fine. I'm just a little tired; getting ready for Halloween is always busy."
Emily smiled. "What's Sydney going to be this year?"
Laura sighed. "She hasn't decided yet. Today she was debating the relative merits of Cinderella versus a cat; yesterday it was either going to be Alice in Wonderland or a witch. I told her she has to decide by tomorrow so I can get her costume together this weekend."
Emily grinned. "Good luck with that. Do you want to go out for a drink, or are you too tired?"
"Too tired. Maybe next week. I'll see you Sunday." She left Emily and walked out to her car. Jack's car, actually; the transmission on hers had been acting up for a couple of weeks now. "Going out for drinks after choir practice" was a perfect excuse to give Jack for meetings with her handler, and the reason Igor thought she had joined the church choir when they moved to California. The real reason, the reason she had given Jack, was that she had done a lot of singing when she was younger and missed it.
Irina noticed the tail pull out behind her, of course. She headed straight for the hotel. If it was a CIA tail, the drinks excuse would work fine, since the hotel had a nice restaurant and bar that drew outside business. If it was a KGB tail, well, she was going where she was supposed to go.
"Sh**," said one of the CIA agents in the van and he watched Laura Bristow's car pull into the parking lot of the hotel they had been told to watch for. "What do you know?" He immediately radioed CIA headquarters. CIA headquarters called their operative at the hotel, who moments later gave "Karen Green" the key to a room that the CIA had bugged a week earlier.
